


The Smell of Fresh Cut Grass

by gatesmasher



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Friendship, Gen, M/M, may be read as pre-relationship by the romantically minded
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-06
Updated: 2014-04-06
Packaged: 2018-01-18 08:39:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1421815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gatesmasher/pseuds/gatesmasher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>  Jack and Daniel share a moment over childhood memories.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Smell of Fresh Cut Grass

“Ah, that’s a smell that brings back your childhood, huh?”

Daniel sniffed obediently at the sunny back porch air, but he really didn’t know what Jack was talking about. “Um…some kind of plant, right?”

Jack stared like Daniel was crazy and the archeologist was immediately put on the defensive. Over these first few months Daniel had been on SG-1, it seemed like his and Jack’s friendship had reached an equilibrium, but Jack could still occasionally catch him off guard, often over the silliest things, things the Air Force officer considered obvious, but the foreign-born archeologist had no experience in.

“Daniel, it’s new cut grass,” Jack said as if explaining the importance of oxygen to a kindergartner. “Who doesn’t know that? I think it’s the single most recognized smell in the world. Makes you think of picnics and baseball and earning extra allowance in the summertime.”

“Oh.” Yes, Daniel remembered now, he’d heard the neighbor’s mower going when he’d first come over to Jack’s house this afternoon. Still feeling on the defensive, Daniel picked at the label of his sweating beer bottle, Jack still staring at him like he’d just stepped onto planet Earth through the Stargate. “Well, that wasn’t really _my_ childhood, Jack.”

Jack blinked, then leaned back in his Adirondack chaise-lounge, understanding dawning on his face. “Ah, right. Egypt.”

“Yes.”

“But when you came to America, your foster parents didn’t have a lawn?”

“New York City apartment.”

“Public parks?”

“I preferred libraries.”

“Of course you did. Okay, Desert Boy, so what’s your big evocative smell, camel dung?”

Daniel looked up sharply, sensitive to derision after a lifetime of experience. But Jack’s smile was friendly and his tone one of mild teasing he seemed to reserve just for Daniel. Daniel returned a tentative smile. “Um, yeah, actually, now that you mention it.”

Smile broadening, Jack asked, “Should we go to the zoo?”

“No, no, that won’t be necessary,” Daniel said with a chuckle.

“So what smell brings back your childhood, then?”

“Well…” Daniel paused, unsure if Jack wanted a real memory or was just making conversation. He glanced sidelong at the person who was fast becoming second only to Shau’ri in his life.

Jack tipped his long necked beer bottle to his lips, his attentive brown eyes showing nothing but encouragement.

“Okay,” Daniel said. “There was this one time… I was seven years old I think, and we’d just cleared a deep strata layer at my parent’s dig in Luxor. The day was blistering hot, so hot I couldn’t even touch the metal spades and probes. Then there was a cloud burst. Those didn’t happen often. The raindrops came down like big fat ball bearings, right into the excavation. And all that exposed sediment, buried for centuries, millennia, bone dry with no direct moisture, it was instantly saturated. And the smell…it was incredible. Not bad, just wet and earthy and…” He struggled for a second, finally breaking off with a laugh at himself: a linguist who couldn’t find the right word. “I’d forgotten all about it, really; I was so young. But then last year on Abydos, Skarra and I were digging an exploratory hole for a well and the same thing happened: a cloud burst on a scorching hot day. And the smell, god, the same smell, it…it transported me twenty years back to Egypt. I could feel my mother’s hands as she tried to drape a tarp over my head, hear my father’s laugh when I pulled the tarp off and started stomping in the puddles—”

Daniel broke off suddenly. Embarrassed to have blathered on so long. He hadn’t meant to. Jack didn’t want to hear this. He stole another sidelong glance at his friend, blinking as he nervously licked his lips.

Jack watched him steadily. “Well, I can’t compete with that,” he said softly. “But maybe…” He took another swig of his beer. “Maybe you could build some new memories?”

Daniel raised his brows in question.

“You could help me mow my lawn.”

Daniel was helpless against the impish grin Jack flashed. “Okay, Jack, sounds good.”

-end-  



End file.
